


Iris

by crocs (orphan_account)



Category: House M.D.
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Family, Gen
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-12-10
Updated: 2019-12-10
Packaged: 2021-02-26 06:14:00
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,584
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21748840
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/crocs
Summary: If he was actively looking for a strange parallel between himself and a random kid claiming to have half his DNA, there it was.(AU: OG Team era. House may or may not have an illegitimate son. Whatever. That doesn't change the fact that he's got a job to do, no matter how connected to the case this kid may be — having been the one to drop it in his lap in the first place.)
Comments: 9
Kudos: 11





	Iris

**Author's Note:**

> CHAD MICHAEL HOUSE.
> 
> Disclaimer: I don't own _House MD_.

_And I don't want the world to see me_

_'Cause I don't think that they'd understand_

_When everything's meant to be broken_

_I just want you to know who I am_

_— Iris,_ The Goo Goo Dolls

* * *

House sighed as he unlocked the door to his apartment.

He pulled the knit cap off of his head and flung it blindly at the couch as he shut it behind him. House pretended the way he was leaning hard on the door handle didn't mean anything other than he needed some pain relief, stat. It swung shut the single second after he let it go.

Then House was leaning on the wall, his shoulder aching against the apartment wall paint. He knew his left hand was going to have a cris-crossed pattern on it once he stopped resting it on the cold radiator. It didn't stop him from lingering a second longer. He pulled off the steel wool trap with his teeth, throwing the balled up wooden gloves in the same direction.

House ambled into the kitchen, humming slightly under his breath. Some new pop song that Cameron had been playing for the fellows, maybe, from her new slim laptop. He didn't know the name; she'd slammed it down the moment he'd made himself known with a well-placed cough.

It was a shame, really. For someone born the generation after him, Cameron did have a good grasp of what made good music. Well, a semi-good grasp. She didn't know who sung in Led Zeppelin, for starters, and House was pretty sure the space that was occupied by all the Stones' lyrics in his brain was reserved by NSYNC in Cameron's.

JT _was_ dreamy, House had to admit. There was something about bleach blonde ramen hair that just did it for him and teenage girls everywhere.

House opened the fridge, expecting to see something like food. This was a mistake, seeing as though there was nearly nothing in the fridge.

He made a face, reached in and grabbed his leftovers from last night, prying off the Tupperware lid. Then he emptied it onto a plate straight from the dishwasher and stuck it in the microwave. Delicious, supposedly.

While the pasta whirled around, House meandered to the couch, finding the remote under his discarded hat. He switched on the television. Dropping down into the cushions, House shrugged off his coat as he flicked down the channel list. Wrestling was appealing — then again, so was _Jeopardy!._ He supposed that was the failings of cable TV — too many people making morons of themselves. It was a hard choice.

In the end, House settled on the news.

Sure, it was boring — nothing changed, not really; there was always war, or drugs, or the war _on_ drugs — Vicodin not included, thank whoever, House really didn't have time for that — or stupid opinion pieces that House was sure were only put on the TV to make people want to tear their eyes out.

Maybe it was provoke them into action, maybe it wasn't. Usually, the only action viewers of his local station took was moaning at work about what was said the evening before. Protests in the street would be too interesting, apparently, and the world hated interesting things.

It certainly hated him.

House's head lolled back on the couch cushion as he let the music of the adverts wash over him. He took a deep breath. And then he took shallower and shallower ones until he was nearly almost panting, really, except he wasn’t short of breath. He could control it.

House closed his eyes and rummaged around in his jean pockets. His fingers brushed against the Braille-dotted, paper sticker around his Vicodin. It was different to the plastic-smooth texture that the rest of the container had.

If his eyes were open, House thought, he'd still be seeing the same writing: GREGORY HOUSE, block letters, the rest of the prescription underneath. Writing as sterile as the first day he'd been prescribed them.

With his eyes still closed, House unscrewed the lid and tapped out a pill. He pressed it to his mouth.

He swallowed it down with the left-open beer on the coffee table. It tasted stale.

The microwave beeped in the distance, and then stopped abruptly. House stayed where he was for a second before he lurched toward, pulling himself up.

Halfway through doing that, though, the microwave beeped again. And shriller, this time. Almost like a doorbell, except House didn't have a doorbell. He'd very purposely knocked it down with his cane a month after moving in and never 'complained' to the landlord.

 _Then_ House remembered that Wilson and him had drunkenly rewired one back in a month after the divorce.

…He had a bad leg. He was _allowed_ to forget. Besides, it wasn't like many people came to House's door; he'd already established himself in his apartment building as being as much of an asshole as he was at work at home. Mostly, he kept to himself — and his neighbours warned the door-to-door salesmen to maybe skip apartment 221B.

House groaned and reached out for his cane, pulling himself back up again.

He walked to the door, prepared his grumpiest face — surprisingly, it wasn't that different to his regular one — and opened it, ready to grapple with whoever was behind it.

Well, not grapple. Spar verbally, maybe. Unless it was drunk Wilson, again. Drunk Wilson never really understood wordplay, especially when it was directed towards him in a — probably — negative way. Drunk people were easy to make fun of, after all. If House wasn't going to grab the low hanging fruit, he reasoned, who would?

It was a teenager on the other side. A teenager. A teenager with the handle of a baby car carrier wrapped over his arm.

House blinked.

The kid looked up at him as he took the door off of the latch. Well, 'up' was a strong word — he had to be a couple of inches taller than House, even though House hadn't toed off his sneakers yet.

The thing was, House didn't know any teenagers, even though they were what kids grew into. He _did_ have a few kid cousins, here and there, but unless one of them had grown three feet since he last saw them at mandatory-Thanksgiving, House was at a loss.

And House didn't like not knowing things. He didn't like people thinking that they could just come to his door, either.

"I think you've got the wrong place," House said, because even if it was one of his cousins, he wasn’t here for free rent. Or to offer sage advice. "See, the babysitter-hooker is two doors down. Easy mistake, I know."

"No," said the kid, though a look of momentary panic — and satisfying confusion — crossed his face. Score. "No, I, uh, I don't think so. You're Greg House, right? You're a doctor?"

"Creepy," commented House. "Still not a hooker, though. She's —"

"Two doors down, yeah, I know, you said," the kid rushed. He paused. "Wait. A babysitter and a —"

"She's a very versatile person," House answered. "In both senses of the word. What do you want, anyway?"

The kid's eyes flickered between him and the baby. He seemed to make up his mind.

"My name's Austin," he offered, finally. He planted his feet and looked up, taking a deep breath. "You're my father. I, uh… I really need your help."

House's mind went… blank.

_What?_

He pointed to the baby carrier. "…Is that deluded too?"

Austin's head snapped up. "What?"

Getting his sense of bravado back, House rolled his eyes. "Does the baby think I’m its father too?"

"No, she's my half —" Austin shook his head. His knuckles were white around the plastic handle. "I don't _think_ I'm your son, I know I’m your son. God —"

"What, did Mommy point to my picture and go _that's your dad, sweetie_ after you ran home and started crying even though Daddy went to go get cigarettes and never came back?"

"That's not —"

"Newsflash!" House said. "Mom lied. Everybody lies. You're not special. So take your sister and _go home_."

And with that, he shut the door in his face.

A second passed.

Austin's voice began to echo through the door.

"Come _on_ , man! I drove two hours to get here. Aren't you the least bit curious why? I thought you were supposed to be Sherlock Holmes or something!"

House rubbed a hand over his face. He groaned, shot a cursory glance at the hot newsanchor he was abandoning and crossed back through the hallway.

"I'm only doing this because Wilson told me not to entertain my stalkers any more," House said, as he held the door open for Austin and the baby. "That's the only reason."

"Sure," said Austin, as he bustled through. The baby remained quiet as he did, which was a blessing. House wasn't sure he could deal with a crying infant at all, never mind late at night. "That's the only reason. Who's Wilson?"

"Hey, you're 'desperate', you shouldn't use sarcasm," said House. "You're a terrible stalker, by the way, if you don't know who Wilson is. I'm giving you a bad review on Yelp. Two stars."

Austin looked at him from the couch, unimpressed. The hand that had previously been choking the baby car seat to death was now rocking it slowly.

"Has anyone ever told you you're kind of mean?"

House laughed. "Yeah," he said, at length. "It's kind of my thing. Like _your_ thing is latching on to people you don't know as a much needed father figure."

"I don't need a dad," said Austin. _Interesting_. "I need a doctor."

"Well, this apartment's too high up to get an ambulance up here without pissing off the landlord," House mused. Austin looked at him incredulously. "I mean, we could always airlift you. Feeling faint?"

"I'm _fine."_ Austin let out a short breath that kind of sounded like a very small sigh. "It's not me that's sick. It's Isla." He nodded towards the sleeping baby.

House raised an eyebrow. "Babies throw up. It's kind of their thing. Plus, I'm not an OB. I'm the —"

"Head of diagnostics," Austin finished. He folded his hands in his lap. "You have a whole team. A department, right?"

House ignored his question. "Why couldn't you have stayed where you were?"

"Because every time we got her checked out the doctors kept on saying that she looked normal and that they couldn't do any tests for her and —" He took a deep breath, his voice scratchy. "There's something wrong. She keeps crying and curling up. And I know that's what babies do, but babies aren't supposed to — poop _blood_. And Isla keeps on getting better before I can tell Mom or our OB and I just know they won't listen to me —"

"Hey," House said. He knelt down in front of Austin, trying his best to ignore the lance of pain shooting up through his leg. He put a hand on Austin's arms. "Breathe. You're panicking. You need to calm the hell down. How long has this been going on?"

"A couple of days," Austin said.

He looked straight at House. With a start, House realised that the kid's eyes were blue.

Just like his.

The same shocking shade. It was an irrational thought, of course — House wouldn't have even realised it if he hadn't been introduced to him as his 'father' — but House still found himself wanting to look away to forget it.

"Can you help?"

House stood. "Define help."

"Can you _diagnose_ her?" Austin stood as well. "I know you think I'm crazy for saying that you're my dad —"

"— Because I'm not," House interrupted. "Duh."

"— But the fact is is that you _are_ ," he finished. "And I want you to be the one to treat her. Please," Austin added. "You can act as if we've never met before if you want."

"Trust me, I will," House said. He grabbed his cane, hyperaware of how Austin was tracking his movements. "You can tell me in the car what other symptoms she's got."

"In the car?" Austin frowned, face scrunching up. "Where are we going?"

"The _hospital_ ," House sounded out slowly, already pulling his hat back on. "What, do you expect me to work here? I'll get distracted by the TV. I always do; it's usually much more interesting than my fellows."

"You have _'fellows'?"_

"You did point out earlier that I had my own department," House pointed out, raising an eyebrow. "Do you not know how people become doctors?"

"I —" Austin said, and then gave up. "Thank you," he said, instead, and — further proving the point that Austin was _not_ a House — sounded fully serious about it.

"Grab the kid, get in the car," House said. "And, seriously, for the love of _God,_ do _not_ mention it."

* * *

Chase frowned. He sat up straighter in his seat. "Who's that?"

Cameron followed his eye line to House, who was talking to — a _kid?_ — down the corridor. She shrugged.

"Might be a patient."

"House never talks to patients," Foreman said, as he put the coffee on. He turned around, leaning back on the counter. "Well, unless he wants to rub something in their face."

"Which is all of the time," Cameron pointed out. "Mostly."

Chase rolled his eyes. "Sure," he said, tucking a stray hair behind his ear. "Ten becks he comes in and says he’s his clone."

"You're on," said Foreman.

Cameron turned in her seat as House walked into the room, sans-kid.

"New patient," he announced, crossing to the board, and Cameron shot a victorious smirk at Chase. "Nine months old, female, presented four days ago with acute pain in the stomach. Crying all the time and pooping blood, apparently."

Chase raised his hand, but Foreman cut across him.

"She's a baby," he said, crossing his arms. "Babies cry. I mean, what's so special about this one?"

House whirled around and pointed at Foreman, accusatory. Foreman rolled his eyes.

"What's so _special —_ c'mon, Cameron!" House said, suddenly rounding on her. "Normally you'd have anyone that even showed a bit of moral greyness dead to rights by now. Balls in a clutch." He made a fist.

Cameron's eyes widened. Then they narrowed.

"I'm with Foreman," she said. "It's just not… I don't know. Shouldn't the baby be in paediatrics? Or obstetrics?"

"An ill barely-foetus does not a case make, apparently," mused House. He gave them all a final, sweeping look before turning back to the board. "Foreman says 'just a baby', even though babies don't poop blood. _Yes,_ Chase?"

Chase put down his hand, sheepish.

"Could be an intussusception," he said, as House scribbled it down. "Bit of telescoping and the bowel's in the wrong place. Leads to abdominal pain that comes and goes in infants."

Cameron shook her head.

"I don't think so," she said. "I mean, it's one of the most common types of emergency for kids of that age." She turned to House. "I mean, did the patient see a doctor before coming to… you?"

House pointed at himself in a stupor before shaking himself of whatever he had been working up to.

"Might I remind you that the _infant's passing blood?_ " He shook his head. "Anyway, I don't know. Why don't you go and ask the next-of-kin?"

"Wasn't that what you were doing?"

"What?" He looked around. "Was I?"

"Yeah, outside," Chase continued, looking agitated and a bit confused. "You were just talking to that — teenager."

"Oh, _him_ ," said House, as if that was illustrative enough. "Yeah, that's my new personal assistant, Dirk. He's also my travelling therapist and soundboard and verbal punching bag and… golf caddy. Yeah, that sounds believable."

 _Isn't that Wilson's job?_ Foreman frowned.

"So he's not the next-of-kin, then?"

"No, but he's the closest thing you've got," House said. "Mommy's in New York and Daddy's at the store buying cigarettes." A strange look crossed his face, but he seemed to shake it off. "Aren't you supposed to be doing your jobs right now? Patient _history_."

The fellows — apart from Foreman, who was already standing — scrambled to their feet.

Chase paused before he left.

"So, _not_ a clone, then?" he asked, slightly disappointed.

House raised an eyebrow.

"Who said he wasn't a clone?"

* * *

Wilson patted the files in his out-box into place, finally finished with the stack of paperwork he'd been given yesterday. A smile overtook his face. He hadn't had a moment of peace since Cuddy had surprised him with the stack; Wilson had even had to file some more after he'd realised that there had been a few mistakes on the papers.

It hadn’t been pleasant to sort out.

Wilson breathed in. He leant back in his seat, satisfied. He debated whether to go to the cafeteria to get another cup of coffee, but he realised that he wouldn't need it: he was basically done for the day, anyway.

His eyes flickered over to his computer. _Maybe one game of Solitaire wouldn't hurt…_

_Cre-eak._

Wilson tried to hide his sigh as the door to his office was pushed open. House's head followed his cane. He sat down with a huff.

"What's wrong?"

"Why does something have to be wrong?" House countered. He leant forward, almost resting his elbows on Wilson's desk. "Maybe I just wanted to see my best friend. I'm destroyed emotionally. I'm suing you."

"Yeah, okay," Wilson said, "no. You only see me at work when you need advice and usually that advice ends with you running off to save a patient. And, judging by the file in your hand, you haven't even started treatment yet. So, what's wrong?"

House tilted his head. He clicked his tongue. "What would you say if I said I was your son?"

"I'd say _'you're a little old'_ ," Wilson said. "…Why?"

"Why do you think?" House threw a hand in the air. "Last night I was visited by a teenager who said that I needed to help his sister because I'm his dad and I, like, owed him. For abandoning him." House frowned. "He'd done research on me — he knew I was in diagnostics."

"Who's his mom?" Wilson asked. House gave him a blank-yet-guilty look. "What, are you saying you didn't _ask?_ "

"It doesn't matter," House said. "I'm not his dad. I _can't_ be."

"Do I have to give you the sex talk?"

"Do I have to give _you_ the sex talk?" House retorted, and immediately backtracked. "Well, I mean, you are divorced, maybe there was a reason —"

"There was a reason," Wilson said, but what he didn't say was _I was hanging out with you and blowing off my wife so much that she began to think that I was cheating on her with you. "_ So what's the kid's name?"

House shrugged. "Eh, I forgot."

"House —"

"It's Austin, okay? Geez," House said. "I did forget the last name, though. You've got to give me credit on that."

"And that's his sister in that file," Wilson confirmed. "And he went straight to you."

"Didn’t know there was an echo in here, Wilson," House said. "So?"

"So what?"

"So _what do I do?"_

"…Well, that depends on what you want help with," Wilson said. "Do you want help proving that Austin isn't your son? I can't do that, I don't do — blood, I guess. You'd need to submit for a paternity test." He raised his hand to keep House from interrupting because, really, the guy looked like he was about to. "Do you want to connect with him? Literally ask him about himself. He'll open up if you do. What do you want?"

"I want to solve this case," House said. "Austin isn’t my son. His sister is my patient. End _of,_ Wilson."

Wilson frowned. "Then why do you need my help?"

"I guess I didn't." House rose. He leant over suddenly and shot one last look at Wilson's computer. "Rook to B4, by the way."

Wilson swung his monitor closer to him without looking at it. "I'm playing solitaire."

"No, you accidentally launched Chess," House pointed out. Wilson looked properly. So he had. "Rook to B4."

"Aren't you supposed to be, I don't know, saying lives?"

"Rook to B4, Wilson. Come on!"

Wilson _very obviously_ moved the piece to the corresponding space. "Happy?"

No response. Wilson looked around.

The room was empty. House had left.

* * *

House scowled as he entered the children's department.

The nurse who passed him when he did so didn't give him a second look. That was probably to be expected, he thought.

Most of the doctors at PPTH assumed that the paediatricians in the hospital had it easy; after all, the hardest thing that they had to deal with were tiny humans who were too under-developed to make their own mind up about disobeying doctor's orders and parents who were too scared to question their decisions.

House knew better.

Dealing with screaming little assholes all day? _No, thanks_ , he thought. Lots of things could go wrong when you worked with kids: people seemed a lot more attached to their babies living than their cheating husbands.

One wrong move, and… well, that was it. Your career was ruined. A kid died, and then you had _that_ on your conscience.

And on your record. And some wrecked next-of-kin blaming you.

"Doctor House," said the receptionist at the desk. He turned around. "Haven't seen _you_ around here in a while."

 _Three babies, janitor with a cold,_ House's brain supplied. He pasted on a smile.

"Eh, you know, I'm thinking of coming here when Cuddy gets on the Vogler Kool-Aid again and inevitably takes Diagnostics away from me."

The receptionist raised an eyebrow. " _Really_."

"Nope," House said. He paused. "I'm looking for, uh…" _last name, last name, come on…_ "Uh, Austin. And Isla. One's a baby, the other's not?"

She sighed. "That's all you're going to give me?"

 _It's all I really know._ "I seem to have misplaced my file. Lost it in an intense bet. You wouldn't understand."

"Luckily for you," the receptionist said, ignoring him, "the rumour mill has been going. Everybody knows you're treating somebody in Paediatrics. Your patient's in 302. But," she said, holding the pass further than he could reach from in front of the desk, "she's being looked over by a different doctor. You wouldn't want to disturb them."

House reached over and snatched the pass away.

"She's my patient. I'll do what I want." He furrowed his brow. "Why is there another doctor involved? Like I literally just said —"

"— She's your patient," the receptionist finished. "It's one of your fellows. Cameron. She said you wanted them to get patient history."

"Where are the rest of my fellows?"

The receptionist crossed her arms.

"How am _I_ supposed to know?"

"You just referenced a 'rumour mill'," House stated. "Come on, uh —" he glanced at her name tag — " _Laverne_. Jack into your nurse-secretary-doctor Matrix hive mind."

When she didn't react, he reached into his pocket.

Two dollars.

It would have to do.

He presented them to Laverne, who immediately pocketed it. "Chase is trying to score a date with Dr. Ford," she said. "Foreman is on a coffee run."

House sighed, disappointed. "Well, I could have told you that," he said. "Waste of two dollars. I want them back. 302, did you say?"

"302."

"Got it," House said, and waved Laverne away. She stayed put.

He moved.

Down the corridor — all the way to 302.

The hallway the Three-Oh suite of rooms were on had glass on one side, looking out towards an internal garden. Well, garden was a stretch — had been since '92, when they'd installed a slew of permanent play equipment that never got used. It was hard to go on a swing set when you were dying of smallpox.

So there they rusted — the doors were all locked, because _kids_ — just sitting there for people like House to look at, accidentally focus on their own reflection and getting pretty horrified at the sight of their own appearance.

Not that House particularly cared whether he looked haggard or not. It added to his mystique, the bags under his eyes from the nights spent awake from the pain in his leg.

Running yourself down was the new black, after all.

House turned at the door, walking in.

Cameron spun around. The baby's file was in between her hands.

"House," she said. She appeared to flounder, realising that her fellow — fellows — weren't there. "Chase and Foreman —"

"Do I really want to know?" House asked, even though he kind of already did know. Life was funny that way. "…Where's the kid?"

"The baby?" Cameron gestured with her file. "Right there, in the cot. Asleep."

"I meant the other one. The moody one. _Nine Inch Nails_ -lite."

"You mean your personal assistant, _Dirk_?" Cameron asked. House almost grinned to himself. _Damn_ , he was good. "I told _Austin_ to go clear his head after I got Isla's personal history. I'm just doing some preliminary findings."

House tried to ignore the way that Cameron had clearly already — somehow — personally connected to his patients. After all, it was something she did on the regular; it was nothing. Certainly not anything that would normally twist his stomach.

What if Austin had told her that he thought that House was his father?

He shook his head. "And you didn't think to ask him to stay in case something came up during your 'findings'?"

"What, and push a clearly-stressed teenager to a breaking point?" Cameron shook her head. "Austin looked like he needed a breather. And I'm talking desperately. Where's his parents?"

"I don't know," said House, slowly, because — well, though he knew where Austin's supposed father was, he hadn't thought to ask about the mother. At all, just judging by the fact that he has failed to tell Wilson her name. "Where is he?"

"House —"

" _House,"_ House mimicked in a whiny voice that he knew sounded nothing like Cameron. " _Oh, House, I have no idea, the last I saw him he was busy abandoning —"_

"He found a guitar in the kids' music therapy room," Cameron said, testily. _Note to self,_ House thought. _Dumb high pitched voice works wonders to annoy and press._ He'd have to try it out on the other fellows _._ "He's playing to some of the long term patients."

Great. He'd have to weave his way through a mosh pit of oxygen tanks. "In the music room?"

"Why are you so interested in this case?" Cameron asked instead of answering. She crossed her arms. "You normally don't care. At all."

"I don't care," House said, but his heart felt tight. His grip became white-knuckled on his cane. "You care. That's your shtick. And you care about this baby. All babies. Because that's who you are, Cameron."

Cameron raised an eyebrow. "A… baby?"

"A baby- _lover_ ," House clarified, as if that made any more sense. He was now officially floundering. "A _feelings_ … haver."

"Right," Cameron said, though she took a second to parse it. "Okay, fine. He's — yeah, he's in the music room. But if you don't give him a second —"

"He's got his seconds," House argued. "His _fifteen_ seconds of _fame_ , playing to that sea of hormonal kids. They probably think it's Justin Timberlake. Hey, that noodle hair —"

"House," Cameron said. She glanced at the door meaningfully.

House got the hint.

"You have lipstick on your teeth," he said, as a parting blow — mostly to have the last word — and left.

The music room was further down Three-Oh.

It was a big old echo-chamber squat in the middle of the paediatrics department. There were pianos — well, three keyboards and a broken grand pushed into the corner of the room — and some recorders — one of which was missing, 'requisitioned' by House and currently stuck at the bottom of his drawer, disinfected, ready for him to play in Foreman's ear.

And guitars, apparently.

Being able to play an instrument wasn't something that was passed down. House knew this. He also had the ability to play guitar, so House knew that lessons had to be involved somehow.

…But if he was actively looking for a strange parallel between himself and a random kid claiming to have half his DNA, there it was.

House heard the music before he reached the open doorway. Acoustic — the shitty, half tuned hundred-dollar kind with a neck far too wide and bought by someone who had no clue about clean-sounding chords and only knew that they had to populate the music room with cheap instruments on a budget.

It made House want to claw his ears off.

What stopped him was the skill. The kid had obviously practised the song a lot; it actually sounded half decent-ish despite the obvious setback. It wasn't just a pick-up-play-Wonderwall deal. House could appreciate that.

He leant against the doorframe and just… watched for a moment.

The audience of child patients in front of Austin was enraptured.

To his part, Austin was actually singing _to_ them — he was kneeling down, stopping the pop bullshit to point and get people involved — a real showman. Which, now that House thought about it, was probably a point against him telling the truth about being his son. If he could act so well to other kids…

The pop bullshit faded away to claps from the eleven-year-olds in front of him.

House braced himself to push away from the wall.

It was the perfect moment to talk — he looked like he was at the end of whatever set he'd created — but a tap on the shoulder caused House to turn instead of plough forward.

There was a woman standing next to him. She looked like her name was Karen or something else soccer-mom-worthy, but House could tell by the bags under her eyes that her kid wasn't playing a sport of any kind.

Unless that sport was staying alive.

Karen pointed at Austin. "He yours? Talented."

House blinked.

"He is," he said, but only to the last part. There was some talent there — _raw_ , sure, but there. "Is your —"

Karen shook her head.

"Bed-bound," she said, confirming House's thoughts. "I heard the noise. Came to check it out."

As if on cue, the kid started playing the opening to Rush's _Tom Sawyer._

Not just pop bullshit, then, House thought. He approved.

_"Though his mind is not for rent, don't mark him down as arrogant…"_

So _that_ was what the tuning was for. House watched as Austin began to finger-drum on the guitar base in lieu of an actual drum. It was impressive, considering that the strings were nylon.

When he finished the set — finally — Karen slinked away with a nod. The room was silent — and then there was another round of applause.

Austin's blue eyes scanned the room as he gave the guitar to one of the attendants. They seemed to freeze on House.

The kids filed out until it was only them in the room. House begrudgingly held the door open for the last of them.

House crossed over to Austin. "Not bad."

"The guitar?" Austin shrugged, standing up. "Yeah, I'm in a band. Well, I was. We kind of broke up. How, uh, how long were you standing there?"

"Tragic," House said. A twinge in his leg led him to sit down on one of the chairs the attendants had dragged out for the kids. After he got settled, he stared at the chair next to him until the kid dropped next to him. "Whole of your last song. We need to talk."

Austin's face paled. "Isla?"

"No, no," House said, raising an eyebrow. No House cared that much about other people, not even if they were a blood relation. It just wasn't done, apparently, in his own experience. "You. Who's your mom, kid?"

"I'm _not_ a kid," Austin said. "And — okay, why don't you believe me? Why can't you just believe that I'm your son without —"

"— Proof?" House finished. "Well, I don't know. Seems like a pretty good thing to have. I'm a doctor — force of habit to assume that everybody lies."

"This is just wasting time," Austin protested. "You could be treating my sister right now, man."

"You could be _with_ your sister right now, _'man',"_ House pointed out. Austin looked away. "Stop distracting. Mom's name — _now_."

Austin sighed.

Then he rubbed his eyes. "Sarah," he said, finally. "Sarah Grey. She's an endocrinologist. You guys went to —"

"— _Johns Hopkins_ together. Yeah," House said. If he wasn't already sitting down… "…I know."

Austin's relief was palpable.

"So I'm right," he surmised. "You're my dad."

"Keep your voice down," House hissed, even though he knew that they were just at talking level. He needed a Vicodin. Something told him that popping one in front of an impressionable ki — _young man —_ wasn’t a good idea. "And no, you're not."

Austin spluttered. "It's the only thing that makes _sense_ ," he insisted. "You guys dated at the right time."

"I can't be your father," House found himself saying. It was the only thing that he _could_ say. That he was hanging on to. "I just… _can't."_

Austin opened his mouth to argue, but anything he could have said was cut off by House's pager. It beeped, angry, at something or another.

House flipped it open and scanned the message. He stood up abruptly.

Austin looked taken aback. "Where are you going?"

"Your sister," he said, at length.

Austin paled and jumped to follow him to 302. 

It was going to be a long case. House could tell.

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you so much for reading!


End file.
